Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert SoutheyCottle, Joseph
General
Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey
Cottle, Joseph
Authors, English -- 19th century -- Biography; Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 1772-1834; Southey, Robert, 1774-1843
Many years before, I had taken down, then by express, invitation, Mr.
Southey, to see these excellent ladies; and in the year 1814, I conducted
Mr. Coleridge to Barley Wood, and had the pleasure of introducing him to
Hannah More and her sisters. For two hours after our arrival, Mr. C.
displayed a good deal of his brilliant conversation, when he was listened
to with surprise and delight by the whole circle; but at this time,
unluckily, Lady--was announced, when Mrs. Hannah, from politeness,
devoted herself to her titled visitant, while the little folks retired to
a snug window with one or two of the Misses More, and there had their own
agreeable converse.
Hannah More's eminently useful life manifested itself in nothing more
than the effort she made to instruct the ignorant through the medium of
moral and religious _tracts_, and by the establishment of schools. These
were made blessings on a wide scale, whilst their good effects are
continued to this time, and are likely to be perpetuated.
It is here proper to mention that after superintending these various
schools, either personally or by proxy, for more than a quarter of a
century, and after the decease of her four benevolent and excellent
sisters, Hannah More found it necessary to leave Barley Wood, and to
remove to Clifton. Here her expenses were reduced one half, and her
comforts greatly increased. The house she occupied, No. 4, Windsor
Terrace, Clifton, was even more pleasant than the one she had left, and
the prospects from it much more enlivening. I remember to have called on
her with the late Robert Hall, when she discovered a cheerfulness which
showed that Barley Wood was no longer regretted. She brought us to the
windows of her spacious drawing room, and there, in the expanse beneath,
invited us to behold the new docks, and the merchants' numerous ships,
while the hill of Dundry appeared (at the distance of four miles) far
loftier than her own Mendip, and equally verdant. From the window of her
back room also, directly under her eye, a far more exquisite prospect
presented itself than any Barley Wood could boast; Leigh Woods, St.
Vincent's Rocks, Clifton Down, and, to crown the whole, the winding Avon,
with the continually shifting commerce of Bristol; and we left her with
the impression that the change in her abode was a great accession to her
happiness.
In a letter to Mr. Wilberforce, Hannah More thus rather pleasantly
writes:--
"4, Windsor Terrace, Oct. 29, 1828.
My Very Dear Friend,
... I am diminishing my worldly cares. I have sold Barley Wood. I have
exchanged the eight "pampered minions," for four sober servants. As I
have sold my carriage and horses, I want no coachman: as I have no
garden, I want no gardener. I have greatly lessened my house expenses,
which enables me to maintain my schools, and enlarge my charities. My
schools alone, with clothing, rents, &c., cost me £150 a year."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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